You be happy :)...

The consensus said there'd be 200k new jobs found last month... They were off by 80k...The consensus said China would see a 3.3% inflation rate for March. They were off by 30 basis points... Last week, famed strategist Byron Wien forecast higher stock prices for the remainder of this year... Mark Faber (editor and publisher of The Gloom, Boom and Doom Report) says the "market's at the start of a more significant downturn"...

So what's the market going to do come tomorrow? Just like any other weekday, it'll simply do its thing - provide the auction platform for individuals to react to the latest news/opinions by swapping cold hard cash for shares of corporate stock...

Two Monday's ago, on comments from Ben Bernanke, folks with cash came to market in search of shares... Of course the owners of shares became all of a sudden stingy... They forced the buyers to pay dearer prices than they would have the Friday before... The Dow Jones Industrial Average (an index tracking 30 stocks) jumped 160 points...

Last Friday, the blah jobs number was announced... The auction was closed (it was Good Friday)... I suspect come tomorrow morning the owners of shares will be the ones coming first to market... In fear of suffering the paper loss of this year's paper gains, they'll be offering up their shares to the highest bidder... Problem is, the bidder's will be all of a sudden stingy... They'll force the sellers to sell at less dear prices than they would have last Thursday... Look for the Dow to fall triple digits at the open...

So who are these buyers and sellers - these reactors to news? They would be the trained-trader, the untrained-trader and the untrained-investor... Everyone except the trained-investor... That's you... You watch the news, you shrug your shoulders, you go to work, or golf, or tennis, or swimarobics, or whatever... You know that if the market trades lower between now and your next rebalancing date (like last fall) you'll be a buyer... If the market trades higher between now and then (like this spring) you'll be a seller... You're forever buying while stocks are falling, and selling while they're rising...

Your world is simple, calm... You don't worry, you be happy :)...

Taxes and Tax Revenue (white board lesson)

The one thing they can agree on...

Technology... The one thing the entrepreneur and the [intellectually honest] environmentalist can agree on!!

No government here... No subsidies... Just pure capitalism...

Got the idea from Russ Roberts' blog post,Worth A Thousand Words...

25 YEARS AGO



TODAY

April 4, 2012 TV Segment (video)

April 4, 2012 Market Commentary (audio)

CLICK HERE FOR TODAY'S COMMENTARY

After the dust settles...

A week ago Monday a dovish Ben Bernanke inspired a buying spree that pushed the Dow some 160 points higher... Released yesterday; the minutes from the FOMC's last get together - suggesting Bernanke's cohorts don't necessarily share their fearful leader's sentiment - inspired an immediate 90 point sell off...

Of course we all want the market higher, but this is clearly one of those careful-what-you-ask-for moments... And one of those moments where we separate traders from investors... Traders are forever after the quick hit, and, for them, there's nothing better than the printing of money... Investors, on the other hand, are looking for sustainability...

Being an investor (and one who counsels investors), in terms of the recent "Fed" news, I'm liking the latter; the idea that they don't see a strong need for round number three of asset purchases... If they stick to those guns, bonds will suffer (they're over-due), but the impetus (a strengthening economy) should be bullish for stocks... After the dust settles that is....

Stay tuned....

Give a man a fish - or bait his hook?

Mitt Romney's senior advisor shakes up his boss's campaign by suggesting the candidate will reset his platform, as needed, like an 8 year-old resets an etch-a-sketch... President Obama whispers in Russian President Medvedev's ear that he'll show more flexibility after his election...

Now that we have that (a reminder that politicians are, well, politicians) out of the way, we can focus on the business at hand... Choosing the candidate whose platform best fits "our" ideology... We'll see if, as a nation, our ideology is any different today than it was almost four years ago...

As confusing as the competing narratives can be, doesn't it always narrow down to the basic "we'll give you the fish vs. we trust you to catch your own (after we bait the hook for ya)"? Or you might say; whose bait (which the informed individual [per below] will take with the proverbial grain of salt) will hook this November's voter?

http://youtu.be/5DmtPA02SNk

http://youtu.be/4aWFxSNMguk